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biodiversity

BastamagReconciling agriculture and biodiversity by improving farmers’ income

Bastamag - March 05, 2024

“Biodiversity is the basis of agricultural production,” insists ecologist Vincent Bretagnolle. Research carried out over 30 years with farms in Deux-Sèvres shows that protecting biodiversity increases yields.

   

Target the environment to extinguish agricultural anger. This is the choice made by the French government at the beginning of February which notably announced the suspension of the Ecophyto plan. This aimed to halve the use of pesticides by 2030. For the executive, environmental protection would be incompatible with the fact of production: environmental standards are reduced to administrative hassles preventing the agricultural profession to live well. However, scientific studies agree on the role of pesticides - particularly neonicotinoids - in the collapse of bee populations, or the consequences of intensive agriculture on the disappearance of birds and floral diversity.

A large open-air laboratory of 45 hectares in Deux Sèvres, created 000 years ago by researcher Vincent Bretagnolle in collaboration with farmers, shows on the contrary that the protection of biodiversity, particularly pollinating insects, makes it possible to increase yields. This testing ground also reveals that farmers manage to increase their income by reducing pesticides and fertilizers such as synthetic nitrogen. It seemed essential to us in Basta! to broadcast this interview with Vincent Bretagnolle so that this large-scale scientific experiment on changes in agricultural practices is better known.

Sophie Chapelle: Should we talk about erosion or collapse of biodiversity?

Vincent Bretagnolle: Both terms are appropriate. Every year, we witness a slow erosion of biodiversity: we lose 1 to 2% of the number of birds in agricultural areas in all European countries. After 50 years this represents at least 50% of the birds! We can therefore speak of collapse when we take a step back.

What are the most evocative data on this subject?

We have very precise data on bird populations [1]. They decline particularly in agricultural environments – five to eight times faster than in wooded environments, for example. Around thirty species are dependent on the agricultural environment in France – partridges, quails, gray harriers, skylarks, little bustards, etc. These species are decreasing even more quickly than the others.

The data on insects point in the same direction. 90% of European butterflies populations have disappeared from agricultural environments. For locusts and ground beetles, the drop observed is 30 to 50% on our study site. It is therefore not surprising that birds are disappearing since they feed on insects. The decline of one leads to the decline of the other. There is a long-term collapse of biodiversity, insects and birds.

[...]

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farmers vs the European Union

VoltairenetThe European Union against the peasants

Voltairenet - Feb 29, 2024

Throughout the European Union, farmers are standing up against the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which nevertheless subsidizes them.

   

Governments respond with adjustment measures, bureaucratic simplifications and a few words of reassurance. In reality, they are powerless in the face of a structure designed to enforce an ideology that turns out to be crazy.

Throughout Western and Central Europe, peasants are demonstrating. First it was in the Netherlands, Italy, Switzerland and Romania, today in Spain, France, Germany and Poland. This continental-scale jacquerie is rising up against the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the European Union.

When signing the Treaty of Rome, establishing the European Economic Community, in 1957, the six founding states (West Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands) accepted the principle of free movement of goods . They thus prohibited any national agricultural policy.

In order to guarantee income for farmers, they therefore implemented a common agricultural policy. Depending on the Member States, aid from the European Union is paid to the regions which distribute it to farmers or directly to operators (as in France). This is the “First Pillar”. In addition, the European Commission determines production standards in order to improve the quality of life of rural populations and that of their production. This is the “Second Pillar”.

The First Pillar did not resist the enlargement of the European Union, and the transition to global free trade (the EU joined the WTO in 1995) which led to a disproportionate increase in community subsidies. The Second Pillar was shattered by the European Green Deal (2019), which aims to reduce the Earth's temperature by limiting greenhouse gas emissions.

In the absence of a global CAP, there is no solution to the failure of the First Pillar: the Anglo-Saxon principle of global free trade is incompatible with that of European free trade compensated by the European CAP. Floor prices for agricultural products, as announced by various national executives, will not save farmers, but on the contrary will kill them to the extent that we continue to accept imported products at much lower prices.

As for the Second Pillar, it no longer pursues a political objective, but an ideological one. Indeed, the assertion that global warming is not local, but global, is contradicted by temperature readings. While the claim that it does not come from astronomical factors, but from human activity, does not stand up to scientific debate.

Remember that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is not a scientific academy, but a meeting of senior officials (some of whom are scientists, but who always serve as senior officials). civil servants) formed in 1988 at the initiative of Margaret Thatcher to justify the transition from coal to oil, then to nuclear power [1]. His conclusions, although they were approved by governments that could go nuclear, were violently rejected by scientific circles including the prestigious Russian Academy of Sciences [2]. The so-called “scientific consensus” on the matter does not exist any more than the famous “international community” which “sanctions” Russia. However, science does not work by consensus, but by trial and error.

Attempts to develop green tourism in rural areas will not save farmers. At most it will allow them to rent rooms on their farms for a few weeks a year. The problem is not to change activity, but to allow farmers to live and feed their population.

Farmers in Western and Central Europe are today dependent on European subsidies. They do not oppose the European Union which allows them to survive, but denounce its contradictions which suffocate them. The question is therefore not to repeal this or that regulation, but to say what form of European Union we wish to build.

The next European Union elections will be held in June. This will involve electing the deputies of the European Parliament, the only elected representatives of the Union. Indeed, the Council is not elected at Union level, but is made up of heads of state and government elected at national level, as for the Commission, it is not elected at all and represents the interests sponsors of the Union.
The different European construction projects

To understand this strange system, and possibly modify it, let us return to its origin: from the interwar period (1918-1939) to the immediate post-war period (1945-57), there were six competing projects 'union.

1- The first was carried by the Radical Republicans. It aimed to unite states administered by comparable regimes. There was talk then of uniting countries in Europe and Latin America governed in a Republic.
The definition of Republics and Monarchies had no connection with elections and dynastic successions. Thus, the King of France Henry IV described himself as “republican” (1589-1610), to the extent that he devoted himself to the common good of his subjects and not to the interests of his nobility. Our reading of Republics and Monarchies dates from Democracies (the government of the People, by the People and for the People). It focuses on the rules for appointing leaders and no longer on what they do. Thus, we consider the contemporary United Kingdom as more democratic than France and do not take into account the incredible privileges enjoyed by the British nobility to the detriment of its people.
The Argentina of Hipólito Yrigoyen (which was then the main economic power of the Americas) would have rubbed shoulders within this union with the France of Aristide Briand (whose Empire extended across all continents). The fact that these Republics were not necessarily contiguous did not shock anyone. On the contrary, it ensured that the union would never transform into a supra-national structure, but would remain an organ of inter-state cooperation.
This project foundered with the economic crisis of 1929 and the rise of fascism that it caused.

2- The second was that of a union which would guarantee peace. The French Minister of Finance, Louis Loucheur, assured that if Germany and France united in a single military-industrial complex, they would no longer be able to wage war against each other. [3].
It was achieved when, after the Second World War, the Anglo-Saxons decided to rearm Germany. In 1951, the former Petainist minister Robert Schuman created the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC).
The ECSC ended in 2002 and was integrated by the Treaty of Nice into the European Union.

3- The third borrows from the previous two. It was written by the Autro-Hungarian Count Richard de Coudenhove-Kalergi. It aims to unite all the states of the continent (except the United Kingdom and the USSR) within a “PanEuropa”. Initially, it would have been a federation comparable to Switzerland, but ultimately it would have become a supra-national entity on the model of the United States and the Stalinist USSR (which defended the cultures of ethnic minorities ) [4].
This project was more or less carried out with the support of the United States. In 1949, the Council of Europe was created. I write “more or less” because the UK is a founding member, which was not initially intended. This Council developed a Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (CSDHLF). It has a European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) responsible for ensuring its application.
However, from 2009 onwards, many magistrates of this Court have been sponsored, not to say corrupted, by the American billionaire George Soros. Gradually, they interpreted the Convention in such a way as to modify the hierarchy of norms. For example, today they consider that the International Treaties on Rescue at Sea (which provide
to disembark the shipwrecked in the nearest port) must take a back seat to the right of migrants to submit requests for political asylum in Europe.
Today, this Court judges in its absence and systematically condemns the Russian Federation, even though it was suspended from the Council of Europe, then left it.

4- The fourth project, the “New European Order”, was that of the Third Reich from 1941. It involved uniting the European continent by distributing its population, by region, according to linguistic criteria. Each regional language, like Breton, would have had its State. By far the most important state would have been the one where German was spoken (Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, German-speaking Switzerland, Italian Tyrol, Czechoslovak Sudetenland, Slovak Carpathians, Romanian Banat, etc.). In addition, racial criteria would have determined the populations that would have been “reduced” (Jews, Gypsies and Slavs) and put into slavery.
This project was negotiated between Chancellor Adolf Hitler and Duke Benito Mussolini through the German jurist Walter Hallstein. It was partially realized during the Second World War, but collapsed with the fall of the Third Reich.

5- The fifth project was formulated in 1946 by the former British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill [5]. Its objective was to reconcile the Franco-German couple and to push aside the Soviets. It is part of the vision of the Atlantic Charter (1942) for which the post-war world should be governed jointly by the United States and the British Empire. Even more, it contributes to his vision of the role of the United Kingdom supported by the Commonwealth. On the Atlantic side, it develops a privileged relationship with the United States and, on the continental side, it supervises Europe of which it does not consider itself a member.
Winston Churchill launched several institutions simultaneously. Ultimately, it was this project which was carried out first, in 1957, under the name of the European Economic Community (EEC) and then, in 1993, under that of the European Union (EU). It borrows elements from three of the previous projects, but never from that of the union of Republics.
The Anglo-Saxons have always controlled the CEE-EU via the European Commission. This is the reason why she is not elected, but appointed. Moreover, London appointed Walter Hallstein, the former advisor to Chancellor Adolf Hitler on European issues, as its first president. Furthermore, the Commission initially had the legislative power that it shares today with the European Parliament. It uses it to propose standards that Parliament validates or rejects. All these standards repeat word for word those of NATO which, contrary to popular belief, is not only concerned with Defense, but with the organization of societies. The NATO offices, initially located in Luxembourg and today next to the Commission in Brussels, transmit its files to it, from the width of the roads (to allow armored vehicles to pass) to the composition of chocolate (to compose the soldier's ration).

6- The sixth project was developed by French President Charles De Gaulle in response to that of the British. He intended to build an institution not federal, but confederal: the “Europe of Nations”. He deplored the Treaty of Rome, but accepted it. In 1963 and 1967 he banned the United Kingdom from joining it. He specified that if there were to be enlargement, it would be from Brest to Vladivostok, that is to say without the United Kingdom, but with the Soviet Union. Above all, he fought tooth and nail so that questions affecting national security could only be taken unanimously.
His vision disappeared with him. The British entered the EEC in 1973 and left in 2020. Russia was never offered to join and today the EU is accumulating “sanctions” against it. Finally, the next reform of the Treaties provides for a qualified majority for questions affecting national security.

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share your land

BastamagShare your land to make a better living from it

Bastamag - Feb 23, 2024

Three small farms are better than one big one. Sharing agricultural land and buildings to allow others to settle is the choice of a couple of farmers in the Loire. In 20 years, on their 70 hectares, they have gone from 1 to 3 farms where eight people work and live well.

   

We are here on a farm that has multiplied,” says Anne Déplaude, winegrower in Tartaras, in the Loire, in front of stunned students [1]. “Twenty years ago, this farm was in milk and had two partners on 70 hectares. Today, on an equivalent surface area, we now have four farms and eight people working. »

How did they succeed in this bet? The story begins in 2001. Anne arrives on the farm of her companion, Pierre-André. He then raised around forty dairy cows in Gaec with his cousin [2], and delivered his milk to a dairy owned by Danone. “What motivated the reconversion was that we sold the milk to the dairy and it was she who set the price. Our desire was to master the product and go all the way to the finished product,” emphasizes Anne. The project is slowly maturing and moving towards viticulture. From 2003, new vines were gradually planted. “Wine makes it possible to optimize the added value per hectare. We were able to make this change because we had finished depreciating the tool: we were no longer tied hand and foot with the banks. »
Autonomy, a key word

“This financial autonomy has made it possible to preserve our decision-making autonomy” continues Anne. With Pierre-André, they chose a certain type of viticulture: they decided to limit the surface area of ​​plantations to 8 hectares, in order to have a very qualitative approach with old local grape varieties. “We also made the choice of progressive and calibrated investments,” continues the winegrower. They built a building dedicated to winemaking ten years after planting the vines.

Autonomy, the key word in their journey, is also technical. “We trained a lot, we also equipped ourselves, but we were never dependent on external advice. » Pierre-André specifies: "In many farms, it is the seller of phytos [synthetic pesticides, editor's note] who makes the treatment schedule."

“Rather than mechanizing everything, we also chose to employ people,” adds Anne. Two and a half employees now work with the couple. They sell between 30 and 000 bottles per year, half of which are sold directly. “Our reconversion made it possible to free up land which we decided to share to encourage the “multiplication of peasants”. » This is where Philippe Chorier, breeder, comes into the picture.

Pool to avoid debt

“In 2007, I had a free-range pig project, with a strong concern for autonomy,” confides Philippe. Stunned by the cost of mechanization that he observed in various agricultural operations, he envisaged a small-scale structure in which he could minimize his investments as much as possible. He contacted the Déplaudes via the Departmental Association for the Development of Agricultural and Rural Employment (Adear). “Thirty hectares were freed up of which the Déplaudes were not necessarily the owners. Pierre-André accompanied me to act as guarantor and I was able to recover 17 hectares,” says Philippe.

Most of the equipment that Philippe uses is from Cuma (cooperative for the use of agricultural equipment). “I have always had collective tractors. For 3000 euros of shares in Cuma, we can have equipment available and that suits me very well. » The concern for sharing to be autonomous led him to invest in the creation of a butcher's shop in SARL, as well as in a collective cutting workshop. “We share the tool. This makes it possible to pool and amortize costs over 10 people. When we are faced with electricity bills that climb from 600 to 1000 euros, it is better to share it between several people. »

After fifteen years of installation, he is delighted: “I am 100% independent in terms of food and working hours. My building is paid for, I have less pressure. » A few months ago, Philippe in turn sold 2,5 hectares to a young man, a former employee of Déplaude, to allow him to set up in viticulture. “I’m happy to have contributed to him being able to plant vines and get started. »

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farmers: demonstrations resume everywhere in France

ReporterreAnger of farmers: demonstrations resume throughout France

Reporterre - Feb 20, 2024

Farmers have resumed their protest movement: in Marseille, Young Farmers and the FRSEA demonstrated on February 19, targeting administrations.

   

Marseille (Bouches-du-Rhône), report

A cow leading a line of around fifty tractors and a few hundred farmers in the streets of Marseille. The scene amused onlookers, many of whom took out their phones to film. Behind Iris - the ruminant - they converged from several departments, at the call of the Regional Federation of Farmers' Unions (FRSEA) and Young Farmers (JA).

“Our goal is simple. We promised 15 days ago that if the Prime Minister did not keep his word, we would come back to demonstrate,” explained Laurent Depieds, president of the FRSEA of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in front of the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilizations ( Mucem) this Monday, February 19 before the departure of the procession. “First, we want answers about farmers’ income. When out of a hundred euros of products sold, only ten euros go to the producer, it’s class contempt,” says the trade unionist.

“The second subject is food sovereignty. We must stop letting in chickens from Ukraine or Brazil, honey from China and cherries from Turkey. The third point is administrative oppression. The peasants while working risk more than the delinquents,” continues Laurent Depieds, grower of organic aromatic plants in the Alpes-Haute-Provence. “We want the Prime Minister to know that when he goes to the agricultural show [which opens on February 24], it will not be to take beautiful photos and feed his Facebook, it will be to come with concrete proposals », concludes the man at the microphone.

“At the agricultural show, it won’t be to take beautiful photos”

The demonstration must start, but a thirty-year-old in work clothes asks to speak. Amandine, “winemaker in the Var” says she “does not agree with the measures announced. It won't change anything. It's just trifles. At the FNSEA, at the top, it's corrupt, there are conflicts of interest. We need to come together from the grassroots to leave the European Union. We need a Frexit, it is the only way to escape the infernal circle of this rotten Europe,” she urges. Some voices are raised to disapprove. “I’ve never heard bullshit like that,” bellows a man.

Installed on 100 hectares of mixed farming in Velaux (Bouches-du-Rhône), Lionel Giordano came with his son. He has no intention of seeing the latter take over. “No, it’s too hard. I never see my father,” confirms Mathieu, 19 years old.

Lionel Giordano stopped making poultry “last week”. Too complicated with avian flu, even though its exploitation is close to wild bird migration corridors. He continues his cultivation of organic fruits and vegetables sold in Amap and for collective catering, started in 2008, after a first career as a qualified worker in petrochemicals in Berre.

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social psychotherapy

InsolentiaeAgricultural movement: End of social psychotherapy

Insolentiae - Feb 05, 2024

Agricultural unions order farmers to return home.

   

Hahahahahaha. All this is always woven together with the unions which are only the transmission belts of successive governments.

They just organize and channel social discontent.

They are the organizers of collective social psychotherapies.

With the farmers' movement we are reaching heights and objectively it can be seen.

The FNSEA did not want to demonstrate. Overwhelmed by her base, she went there applying all the necessary brakes.

The State, a good sport, allowed some dumping of manure and other slurries to take place.

We let everyone let off steam for a big week.

Then… come on, go, go inside the kennel, bed basket.

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Mozinor - lead in the tank

MozinorLead in the Cistern

Mozinor - January 28, 2024

Mozinor

   

Black sequence.

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convergence of struggles?

AgriInsolentiaeIt's going to be crazy. Towards a convergence of struggles?

Insolentiae – Jan 26, 2024

In the short term, France's economic growth could well experience a slight chill due to farmers' revolt.

   

You probably all feel it.

The problem, or more precisely the major risk, is not just the revolt or the ongoing agricultural jacquerie, however legitimate it may be.

It is the convergence of struggles and above all discontent.

The Yellow Vest revolt never found a political solution. It was crushed by the repression of a State which exploited the police, becoming a militia as soon as there was confusion between maintaining order and maintaining power. The police serve the population. Not a very poorly chosen government by a very poorly elected president with dubious popularity from the start.

A revolutionary climate

The government therefore knows very well that it is walking on eggshells.

From daily inflation to the unjustified increase in electricity which has become a basic necessity for all families in this country, from employment difficulties to daily problems, from the collapse of the health system to our school, and I do not even dare to mention the problems of daily violence in our country, the alert level was exceeded a long time ago.

Our country is a volcano that can erupt at the slightest spark.

Truck drivers and taxi drivers alike have already joined the movement in some places.

Blockages are increasing everywhere.

Finally, and this is also very important to grasp in order to anticipate the way in which this movement could evolve, there is an immense resignation in our country.

This mass resignation of people is silent.

I quickly mentioned what I saw during the snowy episode that we just experienced.

5 centimeters of snow which did not block the cars without chains of managers and other entrepreneurs or directors, but which prevented all the cars of more highly committed employees (and that is an understatement) from driving for two days.

I saw schools deserted by both teachers and students.

I saw empty high schools and colleges, including those who could come on foot.

I saw France stay warm and no longer make the slightest effort.

When I talk to you about this I am not in any form of judgment.

I notice and I say a word. The great resignation.

I ask another word.

The collapse of imaginary belief in the republic.

This is the end of imaginary fiction.

What we are experiencing is Gorbachev's Russia. The illusion of strength, as the colossus is about to collapse.

Our country is going to collapse because no one believes in it anymore.

If the grumbling is repressed, then the pent-up anger will express itself through even more silent resignation and nothing will work anymore.

Macron is an imbecile and so are his clique.

You don't run a country with sticks and flashballs.

You don't run a country through communication and media manipulation.

We do not lead a country against its people with self-certifications and health passes and other QR codes.

Macron is a political idiot, because what he did can give the illusion of remaining in power.

But Macron no longer runs anything in reality.

You know why ?

Because in real life, on the ground, everywhere, this country is on strike.

On silent strike.

On work-to-rule.

But still on strike.

In any case, Macron and his clique have already lost, but even more serious, France has lost, because France has stopped working, stopping dreaming, stopping wanting to build a better world.

If France is on strike, the reason is simple to understand.

We do not govern against the population but with them.

Nobody wants the policy imposed by Macron, his Europe, and his friends in Davos.

No one wants to see their sons die for Zelensky.

I am a simple man.

Fill the bowls and ensure peace.

For this we need our sovereignty and a government that protects our population.

Our urban, suburban and rural population.

Macron is a man from Davos, in no case a president of the French whom he has never loved, will never love.

It is already too late, but all is not lost.

Prepare yourselves !

Charles SANNAT

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angry farmers

France SoirAn outpouring of anger among German farmers leading to a blockade of the country?

France Evening - Jan 10, 2024

This Monday, January 8, the movement “Zu viel ist zu viel” (“Enough is enough”) is spreading across Germany.

   

Although the government partially backed down on Thursday January 4 on the elimination of tax advantages on non-road diesel (NGR), German farmers are not taking off. Road and motorway blockages are looming as the transport federation calls for people to follow suit.

As explained in our previous article, the German Constitutional Court rejected the 2024 budget presented by Olaf Scholz in November. Forced to make budget cuts, the chancellor opted to remove tax breaks on agricultural diesel and the tax on tractors, which triggered the anger of farmers in December.

Government concessions that farmers consider insufficient

The German coalition currently in power (made up of the Social Democratic Party, the Liberal Democratic Party and the Greens) has tried to calm things down. On January 4, the government declared that it was abandoning its plan to introduce a tax on agricultural and forestry vehicles. He also proposed a gradual elimination of tax breaks on agricultural diesel, from 2024 to 2026, instead of a total elimination. These concessions did not convince the German Farmers' Federation (DBV), which reiterated its calls for unprecedented demonstrations for the next two weeks. In Bavaria alone, 180 actions were registered. They start this Monday, January 8.

The unions' demands are clear. They plan to strike until the government renounces imposing any austerity measures on them in the annual budget which is being voted on. The Bundestag Budget Committee finalizes the federal budget for 2024 in the third week of January. It is for this reason that the biggest demonstration is announced a little before, for January 15, in Berlin.

However, the anger is no longer confined to the agricultural world, and is taking on the appearance of a general strike against the budgetary policy of the Scholz government.

A movement that takes on the appearance of a general strike.

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firm law France

ReporterreFrance Farm law, Trojan horse of agro-industry

Reporterre - May 17, 2023

Reauthorized pesticides, support for industrialists... The bill "in favor of the Farm France" contains many environmental regressions, denounce the ecologists.

   

An “open letter to Father Christmas of the FNSEA”. It is in these terms that the president of UFC-Que Choisir, Alain Bazot, describes the bill "for a shock of competitiveness in favor of Farm France", which will be debated in plenary session in the Senate from May 16. Supported by Laurent Duplomb (Les Républicains), Pierre Louault (Centrist Union) and Serge Mérillou (Socialist Party), this text aims to offer “greater protection for our farmers against distortions of competition, both in Europe […] ] than outside”. It is strongly criticized by environmentalists, who fear significant health and environmental regressions.

First grievance: Article 13 of this bill, which proposes to revise the missions of the National Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health Safety (ANSES). Since 2015, this institution has been responsible for issuing, withdrawing or modifying marketing authorizations for pesticides. This article could clearly complicate his task. It requires the Agency to present, in each of its decisions, "a detailed balance of benefits and health, environmental and economic risks".

The spokesperson for the Future Generations association, François Veillerette, considers this legislative proposal “very worrying”: “It would increase the formalities, and risks dissuading ANSES from taking withdrawal decisions. “” It is very serious, confirms the environmental senator of Ille-et-Vilaine Daniel Salmon. She undermines the independence of ANSES, saying that the economic fact must be taken into account, in the face of health and environmental issues. »

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vertical farming

Mr GlobalizationThe ambivalences of vertical farming

Mr Globalization - Apr 28, 2023

Vertical farming is advantageous in terms of saving space, cultivation time and water consumption.

   

It can respond, in complementarity with traditional agriculture, to critical situations of current ecology. However, it also has some limitations that should not be overlooked. Halftone analysis.

Although recent, this vertical, above-ground and urban agriculture is an extension of thousand-year-old techniques such as aquaponics, aeroponics and hydroponics. However, this practice which looks more like technological innovation than ancestral knowledge. Based on the testimony of a fervent practitioner of vertical farming and the example of existing initiatives, here is an overview.

Santiago Helou campaigns for the protection of the environment. He has lived in Canada for a long time and has taken a keen interest in vertical farming in the surrounding urban centers he frequents. He also picks up his arugula at Goodleaf, a vertical farm located 70 km from Toronto, in the city of Guelph.

This type of agriculture quickly captivated him both for its dynamic aspect, in an environment where agriculture is a profession that attracts less and less labor, and for its adaptability to climatic challenges: "Agriculture vertical is one of the many solutions needed to create a more sustainable agricultural industry that is both environmentally friendly and capable of eliminating food insecurity. This is not a silver bullet and will have to be part of a larger strategy that involves a radical restructuring of the institutions of our society”.

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urban bees: how they help our cities

Something fishyThe Secret Life of Urban Bees: How They Help Our Cities

Eel under rock - March 25, 2023

As urbanization continues to expand, the need for sustainable and environmentally friendly solutions becomes increasingly crucial.

   

Among the many ecological champions of our cities, one buzzing hero stands out: the urban bee.

The buzzing world of urban bees is often overlooked, as these tiny insects play a crucial role in keeping the ecosystems of our cities healthy. By pollinating plants, supporting biodiversity and producing honey, urban bees contribute significantly to the well-being of our urban environments. In this article, we'll explore the fascinating lives of these city bees, the challenges they face, and how they help green our cities.
The importance of urban bees

Urban bees are essential pollinators for city gardens, parks and green spaces. They help plants reproduce by transferring pollen from one flower to another, thus ensuring the survival and propagation of various plant species. This is not only vital for biodiversity, but also for urban agriculture, as bees play an essential role in the pollination of fruits, vegetables and other crops. Additionally, urban bees produce honey, a valuable commodity that can be harvested and enjoyed by city dwellers.

The importance of urban bees goes far beyond what one might think at first glance. As primary pollinators in urban environments, these small insects have a profound impact on urban gardens, parks and green spaces. They facilitate plant reproduction by transferring pollen from one flower to another, thus ensuring the survival and propagation of a wide range of plant species. This not only promotes biodiversity in urban areas, but also urban agriculture, as bees play a vital role in pollinating fruits, vegetables and other essential crops.

Furthermore, the presence of urban bees contributes to the overall health of urban ecosystems by supporting a complex web of life. By pollinating flowers, bees help create habitats and food sources for other insects, birds and small mammals, which helps maintain a rich wildlife community in urban settings. Additionally, urban bees produce honey, a valuable commodity that can be harvested and enjoyed by city dwellers. This locally sourced, sustainable product can foster a sense of community and connection to nature, even within the confines of a bustling urban landscape.

The importance of urban bees cannot be overstated. They are essential for maintaining biodiversity, supporting urban agriculture, improving the health of ecosystems and providing a sustainable source of honey for city dwellers.

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France farmland

Equality and ReconciliationPeasants increasingly dispossessed of their land

Equality and Reconciliation - March 02, 2023

Two associations reveal that the grabbing of agricultural land by corporate investors and companies is progressing strongly in France.

   

They endanger peasant employment and organic farming. France has lost more than 100 farms in ten years and 000 agricultural jobs, according to the latest agricultural census dating from 80.

In France, each year, more and more financialized companies are taking over thousands of hectares of agricultural crops. A grabbing that is progressing and which worries the environmental associations Terre de liens and Les Amis de la Terre. Because, who says land expansion, generally says destruction of peasant employment and slowing down of agroecological practices. These detail the phenomenon in two reports published this Tuesday, February 28, on the sidelines of the Agricultural Show.

The Terre de liens study reveals new figures on the state of French farmland ownership, the last reports on the subject dating back to 1982 and 1992. While at the time, land grabbing was almost non-existent, the phenomenon of concentration is today in full expansion. To analyze it, the association aggregated the rare data available. Two conclusions emerge. The first is that four million small private owners, the majority of whom are not farmers and do not know the trade, share 85% of French agricultural land. The land they own generally revolves around five hectares only.

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